XM Satellite Radio has reached an alliance with Samsung to produce a new portable device that plays both satellite radio and MP3s. The device - which does not yet have a name - is to be sold during the holiday season.

The world of celebrity editors got a little smaller yesterday when Jane Pratt, the editor in chief of Jane, said she is resigning as of Sept. 30 from the magazine she founded at Fairchild Publications. Pratt, who has been at the helm of the monthly magazine for eight years, has always been known as an editor who blazed new ground with straightfoward discussions on sex, careers and celebrities.

If television networks could get over their small-screen obsession, they might be able to make some real money. In other words, it's time to for them to think way outside the box.

Lance Armstrong is the ultimate athletic brand: an extraordinary winner, a cancer survivor who rebuilt his body into an endurance machine, an effective corporate spokesman and an outspoken advocate. How many other athletes could, or would, be marketed as Armstrong is by Nike, with a commercial that is a clip from the news conference in which he announced that he had testicular cancer? Or with an apparel and footwear line, made by Nike, called 10/2 for the date of the cancer diagnosis?

Omnicom Group, the world's largest advertising holding company, on Tuesday said quarterly profit rose with higher client spending on marketing campaigns. Omnicom, home to such agencies as BBDO Worldwide and TBWA Worldwide, said second-quarter profit grew nearly 10 percent to $225.8 million, or $1.24 per share, from $206.1 million, or $1.10 per share, a year earlier.

Political advertising is no longer a seasonal sport--just watch the deluge over Justice O'Connors spot.

New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer on Monday plans to announce a settlement of his probe into the way music companies influence which songs get played on the radio, a spokesman for the official said. Spitzer served the four top record companies -- Universal Music Group, Sony BMG, EMI Group Plc and Warner Music Group Corp. -- with subpoenas demanding information on so-called payola, sources familiar with the matter have said.

Kmart is seeking to stimulate back-to-school sales with tunes like "At Auntie Tom's" by Fuzz Townshend and "Here It Goes Again" by OK Go - not to mention a commercial in which boys ogle the denim-clad derrière of a female classmate.

ZenithOptimedia, a wholly-owned unit of France's Publicis, said on Monday that L'Oreal Consumer Products appointed it as agency for media planning and buying across 26 European countries. ZenithOptimedia was competing against incumbent Interpublic's Universal McCann for the contract, whose value was not disclosed. Industry sources said the 2-year contract was a major win for ZenithOptimedia. They estimated the value of L'Oreal's media spending in Europe at some $1.5 billion.

Advertising Week, an organization that aims to improve the image of the advertising business, has promoted itself with an ad deemed so "sexist," "moronic" and "tired" that many felt it actually tarnished the industry's reputation. The ad, which was created pro bono by Omnicom Group's DDB Worldwide, New York, to get people to attend the event, and appeared in the July 18 issue of Advertising Age, featured a tightly cropped shot of a woman's chest in a black bustier. Positioned directly beneath the women's bust are the words: "Advertising: We All Do It."